IL Flathead record broken last nite

Got a call today from a fishing partner of mine. An acquaintance of ours supposedly caught an (unofficial) 82lbr last nite... DNR closed today, so they have it in a live tank and are waiting to get it certified and then will release it... Fish was 50" long with an incredible 37"!!!!!! girth (WOW) . Hope it officially weighs out for him, would be great to have someone I know hold it..

Also, sorry I cant provide any details (water, bait, time, etc etc).. I heard it second hand (VERY reliable source), and would rather not give out any info out of respect to the fisherman that caught it.. If I get a chance to speak with him, I'll try to get the OK to share any info I can...

Sounds like it should have no problem making it, as far as info don't worry the state will provide all that you need oooh: One other thing, if you ever get a fish that is pushing record status, call the 800 hot-line number(same one for reporting) and they will have an official where-ever your at usually with in an hour, no matter what day or time, they will come and do the verification.

I would think that it could be possible for this fish to have lost at least some of the initial weight. I say this because I caught a blue cat on Lake Wilson in Alabama at a King Kat tournament. We weighed it on our portable scale and it weighed just under 42 pounds. We then placed it in a livewell by itself. At the weigh in I noticed that there were six shad in the livewell that were about 10 inches long. Hence, the fish had puked up these shad. When weighed on the tournament scale the fish weighed 39.65 pounds. So, I would tend to believe that the fish could have lost enough weight to not make the state record as the fish I caught lost roughly two pounds in 6 hours and this fish had a whole day to stress and lose weight. Just my thoughts.